Nazi rock star: Ian Stuart - Skrewdriver Biography by Paul London

Author:Paul London
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Midgrd Records AB
Published: 2015-02-15T00:00:00+00:00

All this newly found support was not going un-noticed by the left who quickly petitioned passers-by to have the offending items removed from circulation. The shop keepers refused, the trade being too good to close its doors on. Eventually there were mass demonstrations, newspaper campaigns and even Lady Porter, leader of the Conservative Westminster council got involved.

On more than one occasion, the main shop supplying RAC goods, The Cavern, was raided by Police. They took away stocks of records and magazines, but soon found that they were forced to return them, as none warranted court action. “The shop next door is run by Indians.” Said a spokesman for The Cavern. “It’s not as much fun picking on Indians selling Fascist merchandise.” Contrary to what the campaigners were saying, there was nothing illegal in selling Skrewdriver records and merchandise.

“At the moment they are grossly offensive and repugnant.” Said a legal expert. “But they don’t suggest action or use language against another racial group”. The songs were direct and certainly pulled no punches. The only way they could be termed illegal, was if they actually called for the murder of someone, or threatened a specific group. Even if the records did this, the prosecutors would have to prove that the seller was aware of the exact content of the records.

When someone complained to the Jewish Chronicle, they were told that the Commission of Racial Equality, Crown prosecution service and the Board of Deputies were all powerless to stop the sale of these Nazi goods.

Taking legal action against a musician or band is extremely hard to uphold. There are so many loop-holes and pitfalls. When a record has been deemed offensive, the authorities have dealt with it best by putting pressure on distributors to drop it, thus ceasing its circulation. They had already done this to Skrewdriver and still they managed to get the records in shops.

For the left-wing demonstrators, the situation had its own dilemmas. On one hand they wanted to be seen as the purveyors of freedom of speech and expression, on the other, they were attempting to enforce a censorship that had gone much further than the authorities controls would go.

After much deliberation the Merc took out all the offending material from display. Mr Assad Salahi also agreed to stop selling Hitler T-shirts and Nazi flags, and so eventually only one shop continued selling RAC merchandise. The owner, who used the name Andrew St. John, had split from his brother Michael’s business at The Cavern to set up the Cutdown shop. Unbeknown to Ian and the other bands, Mr St. John was actually a North west London Jew by the name of Andrew Benjamin. A regular at a Synagogue in Mill Hill, Benjamin was happy to mix it with the Nazis, as long as the money continued to roll in. This brought him in direct conflict with his brother and soon he found himself ostracised from the family. “We want everyone to know that we will do everything to stop him.

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